Belief in nicotine’s powers can increase smoking addiction

tunisante September 17, 2016 Health

Scientists gave real and placebo cigarettes to nicotine-addicted smokers
MRI images looked at the area of the brain associated with cravings
To gain more satisfaction, smokers had to not only smoke a cigarette with nicotine but also believe they were smoking nicotine

Shivali Best For Mailonline

Published:
04:44 EST, 14 September 2016

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Updated:
13:00 EST, 14 September 2016

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Smokers get a rush of dopamine when nicotine from a cigarette enters their body.

It’s this chemical reaction that means so many people are addicted to smoking.

But scientists believe there is something else at play – a smoker’s belief in the chemical reaction can also change their cravings.

In a study, researchers have discovered that if smokers don’t think they are getting nicotine, the rush of dopamine never arrives.

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While it has been estimated than around one billion people around the world regularly smoke cigarettes, people have different responses to nicotine. And a new study suggests that these differences may be due to the smoker’s belief about the content of the cigarette (stock image)

THE PLACEBO EFFECT

Each visit, participants underwent an fMRI scan and were administered a cigarette, but each visit tested a different condition:

1) Believes the cigarette contains nicotine but receives placebo

2) Believes the cigarette does not contain nicotine but receives a nicotine cigarette

3) Believes the cigarette contains nicotine and receives nicotine

4) Believes the cigarette does not contain nicotine and receives placebo

The research comes from the Centre for BrainHealth at the University of Texas at Dallas.

Contrary to their expectations, researchers found that in order to satisfy nicotine cravings, smokers had to not only smoke a cigarette with nicotine but also believe that they were smoking nicotine.

Dr Xiaosi Gu, who led the study, said: ‘These results suggest that for drugs to have an effect on a person, he or she needs to believe the drug is present.’

The study involved 24 chronic nicotine-addicted smokers.

Over four visits, participants were twice given a nicotine-containing cigarette, and twice a placebo.

With each type of cigarette, they were once told the accurate type they had, and once told the opposite.

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Each visit, the researchers used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) – technology that measures brain activity by detecting changes associated with blood flow – to capture neural activity in the insula cortex.

This region of the brain plays a key role in bodily perception and self-awareness and is also associated with drug cravings and addiction.

Smokers showed significant neural activity when they were told there was nicotine in the cigarette and smoked nicotine, but not in other conditions

THE COLOUR THAT COULD STOP YOU SMOKING

It has been described as a dreary mix of tar, vomit and olive, but a shade of drab brown widely regarded as the world’s ugliest colour could soon be helping to save lives.

The unpleasant greeny-brown hue will replace the brightly coloured packaging that currently adorns cigarette packets in a number of countries.

Officially known as Pantone 448 C, the brown-green tint will adorn tobacco products in several countries after it was picked out by a marketing company as the colour most likely to put off buyers.

The participants rated their level of craving before and after smoking the cigarette, and also had fMRIs after smoking.

Dr Read Montague, co-author of the study said: ‘We expected the presence of nicotine to show some sort of craving response compared to conditions where the subjects did not receive nicotine despite the belief about the nicotine given, but that was not what we found.’

The fMRI scans showed significant neural activity that correlated to both craving and learning signals when participants smoked a nicotine cigarette and believed its nicotine content was genuine.

However, smoking nicotine but believing it was a placebo did not produce the same brain signals.

These results support previous findings that beliefs can alter a drug’s effects on craving.

The researchers hope that their results could provide insights into possible avenues for new methods of addiction treatments.